The moderating role of women directors in politically connected companies on the performance of Liberian companies
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to analyse the impact of political connections and gender diversity on the performance of Iberian companies as a singular market and considering Portugal and Spain separately.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors used panel data methodology, specifically GMM system estimation model by Arellano and Bond (1991) for the period from 2015 to 2020.
Findings
Results show that the performance of listed Iberian companies is influenced by political connections, by gender diversity and that gender diversity has a mitigating effect on the effects of political connections in each country. The mitigating effect of women is evident in both Portugal and Spain, as they are more cautious and principled, which is valued by short-term investors interested in an immediate investment. However, considering the Iberian Peninsula as a whole, the results indicate that – in the long term – women's political relationships can benefit performance through a better reputation and image, which can lead to better social and economic results in the long term.
Originality/value
To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this paper is original and covers an important gap in the literature when considering political connections and women's impact on these connections as determinants of the performance of Iberian companies.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
The research leading to these results received financial support from the FCT – Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology – under project UIDB/04011/2020 and UIDB/05422/2020 and the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation under Grant Agreement PID2020-113498RA-C22 (IRENE), from the Junta de Castilla y León and the European Regional Development Fund under Grant Agreement CLU-2019–03 (Economic Management for Sustainability Unit of Excellence), from the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation under Grant Agreement PID2020-114797GB-I00 (SODEFGOC) and from the Multidisciplinary Institute of Enterprise (MIE) of the University of Salamanca.
Since submission of this article, the following author have updated their affiliations: Maria Elisabete Neves is at the CERNAS, Polytechnic of Coimbra, Coimbra, Portugal and CEOS, PP, ISCAP, Polytechnic of Porto, Porto, Portugal; and Catarina Proença is at the CEBER, Universidade de Coimbra, Coimbra, Portugal.
Citation
Neves, M.E., Guedes, R., Proença, C. and Lozano, B. (2024), "The moderating role of women directors in politically connected companies on the performance of Liberian companies", Gender in Management, Vol. ahead-of-print No. ahead-of-print. https://doi.org/10.1108/GM-05-2023-0173
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
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